Reading the Board Pt.4

Zero Boards

Zero boards are a common occurrence. When you see a board that
does not contain a straight, flush, or full house possibility
AFTER the river card hits the board, nor is there any three
cards within five ranks of each other and NO three or more cards
of same
suit, and the board will NOT be paired, it is known as a zero
board. The highest possible hand will always be exactly
three-of-a-kind. Zero boards are easy to read and you can easily
figure out what your opponents may be holding.

Examples of zero boards:

37) A K
9
6
4
The best possible hands here are three aces, three kings, three
9's, and three 6's. This same logic applies to the other three
example that follow.

38) K J 8 5
3

39) A
K 9 8
4

40) A
2
6
7 J

So here you don't have to think about the chance of a straight,
flush, or full house possibility. Just think about the
likelihood that your opponent has flopped
a set against you. He or she may have offered you a tell of this
by a lot of preflop raising and then continuing to bet
throughout the hand, then usually its a safe assumption
that he or she has a set of Aces or Kings, with a zero board
such as ex. #37 or #39.

If you hold 5 5,
or 3
3with a board like ex.#38 and didn't see any preflop raising or
action in the hand, chances are you hold the best hand.

If you haven't taken notice, examples #13 through #24 are the
same as examples #1 through #12. The difference is I have added
a turn card. Examples #25 through #36 are the same
as the turn card examples only with the river card added.

Answers to
"Test Your Knowledge" questions
#1-3

1. You can do no more with the kings and the jacks. You must
create some new cards. The answer? Pocket aces to make two pair:
aces over kings.

2. Any two cards you use to call the final bet and turn face up
on table. All are playing the straight on the board.

3. Once you have accounted for all possible quads
(four-of-a-kinds), then you look for the possible full houses,
followed by flushes. Now kings full of 8's and jacks full of 8's
are possible, however a player holding either of those hands would also have, respectfully, kings full of
jacks and jacks full of kings, so those hands wouldn't count.
8's full of kings is the fifth best hand. Now notice that this
logic can be applied to 8's full of jacks, which makes the
ace-high the sixth best hand. (note: the player would have jacks
full of kings also).

By now you should be able to retain some of these hand
possibilities. Now I would like you to challenge your memory
skills without the answers in front of you. Now
take the Hand Value Quiz. Coming Soon!

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